<p>So I'm just after starting sophomore year in high school, I go to an international school in Shanghai, where i've been living for the past year. I'm just starting to think about University seriously, and Brown seems to be my #1 choice. I was wondering if i could possibly get in when the time comes around to apply (I know I have a while but I wanna be prepared). I'm not all that familiar with the American system as I'm Irish and go to an international school, but currently I'm taking IGCSES but I'm going to go on and take IB</p>
<p>So, my grades are mostly c's-b's, but I can get A's when I really apply myself which I'm prepared to do in order to get in.
I'm a third culture kid, living in China has opened me up to being so much more understanding of other people and inspired me to do a lot of volunteer work. I went on a service week with school to renovate an Orphanage in the Tibetan mountainside, where I got to interact with the children and help them to learn some basic english, I also helped to renovate their kitchen. I also did a GLA trip to Costa Rica which was just amazing. I can play the guitar, I love to write my own music. I live for ballet, have been doing it since I was a little girl of 4, it's my passion. I'm an avid reader, loving to read poetry and plays. I also play field hockey, which I am vice captain of the D1 team. </p>
<p>Do you think that I would be a unique applicant? Do you think I would have any chance at all?</p>
<p>From what I can tell, no matter how unique a person may be, unless their parents donated a building or something he or she will need top grades and excellent test scores to have a shot at Brown. The school gets plenty of applicants who live abroad, many applicants who do excellent community service work in and out of their home country etc. </p>
<p>IMO it is way to early in the game to get your heart set on any one school, especially such a hyper competitive one.</p>
<p>Natural academic achievement and curiosity, demonstrated by high accomplishment in your transcript are the most vital parts of a top school applicant. “Uniqueness” by itself, is meaningless.</p>
<p>“I can get A’s when I really apply myself which I’m prepared to do” </p>
<p>Sorry but this won’t cut it. As much as you may like Brown, it and similar schools are not anywhere realistic for you. </p>
<p>Perhaps if you can have an immediate grades/attitude turnaround, some colleges that lightly weigh freshman year grades may consider you.</p>
<p>so @pardullet: if the OP subscribes to your daughter’s path, you predict that “she’s in” versus “at least you might become viable”? Having a very mediocre Fr year, no indication of any academic spark, and the outside chance to develop into a college recruitable FH player (playing in the Shanghai league isn’t going to get her much notice among US college coaches) and she’ll be applying as an International student – and your predict she gets into Brown based on your one anecdote? that’s sure a lot of “ifs” to surmount wouldn’t you think?</p>
<p>No matter how unique you are, having Bs and Cs for any highly selective school will not qualify you most of the time (there are rare cases). You need to spend every free moment improving those grades to show Brown why you would be the right student to take advantage of their fine institution. You wrote that you “can” get As - but clearly you haven’t chosen to so far. Why does Brown, or any other highly selective institution, want to take a chance on you when they might have 100 other students who have shown that they can perform in high school? Keep this in mind – and work hard on those grades. </p>